Forum rules
There are no such things as "stupid" questions. However if you think your question is a bit stupid, then this is the right place for you to post it. Please stick to easy to-the-point questions that you feel people can answer fast. For long and complicated questions prefer the other forums within the support section.Before you post please read how to get help

After I had successfully gotten my friend's iPhone 4 to mount on LMDE, I have had a few people asking me to help them mount their iPhone or iPod touch with 4.x.x firmware on their Linux computer. Since I first did this with Linux Mint Debian Edition, I am writing this tutorial assuming you are using the Debian edition. If you are using regular Linux Mint, some things either won't be necessary or won't work.This tutorial was written assuming you're logged into a root Terminal (type su).

add-apt-repository ScriptTo install the required libraries, you will have to add a PPA repository. The normal way to do this is to use the add-apt-repository command, but that command only comes with Ubuntu-like distros. Fortunately for us, Anant Shrivastava the Techno Enthusiast wrote a script that allows us to use this command. So change directory to /usr/bin/

PPA repositories need a key. So download http://ppa.launchpad.net/pmcenery/ppa/ubuntu/dists/maverick/Release.gpg and save it wherever. Open up the Software Sources settings window. For users using the default Linux Mint GNOME layout with the mintMenu, go to mintMenu --> Control Center --> System --> Software Sources. For users using the traditional GNOME layout with the GNOME-menubar, go to System --> Administration --> Software Sources. Click on the Authentication tab. Click the Import Key File button and navigate to the Release.gpg file you just downloaded. Close the window, go back to your root terminal, and type

If you get errors then something went wrong with either adding the repository or authenticating it, depending on the errors you get. Now that that's over with, lets get to adding the packages required for mounting your iPhone or iPod Touch. First check the update manager to update any packages you already have installed with the newer ones from the repository you just added. Now install the following packages

You will be told that some of the packages have been replaced by others but that didn't seem to be a problem for me. If you run into problems try adding the packages it said replaced the other ones. After this you should be able to mount the iPod and open the pictures in F-Spot.

iFuseiFuse is one of the packages you just installed that allows you to read the music off of the iPod with Rhythmbox (and some other music players, I assume). But by default only root is allowed to use iFuse so you must change this. Open /etc/fuse.conf with the text editor of your choice (I prefer vim)

Now we need to add your user to the fuse group. For users using the Linux Mint default GNOME setup, mintMenu -> Control Center -> System (section) -> Users and Groups. If you're using the GNOME menu bar like I am, go to System -> Administration -> Users and Groups. Click "Manage Groups". Scroll through the list until you find the "fuse" group. Double-click it and check the box next to your name. You may be prompted for your password. Close all dialogs. You should now be in the "fuse" group.

The EndReboot the computer and the iPod should show up in Rhythmbox the next time you try to mount it.

Remember, always unmount your iPod and any other portable storage device by right-clicking on its desktop icon and clicking "Safely Remove Drive". And NEVER unplug the iPod while it's busy syncing its media.

I hope this tutorial helps all the people using the iPhone or iPod Touch with Linux. Reply to this thread if you have any problems. I may or may not be able to help you, but I'm sure someone lurking these boards can. If I see a common problem, I'll try to make an amendment to my tutorial. Good luck to you all.

Last edited by resuni on Sun Jan 23, 2011 5:42 pm, edited 1 time in total.

just want to say:1st: i don't have an Iphone or Ipod, so this how-to is useless to me,2nd: but if it can be of any good for anybody, i think it starts wrongly, and i explain why:

- there's no need to enable the add-apt-repository functionality, specially though a script;- if you really need those pkgs add the repo to your source.list and after comment it out, easier! and safer!- this way you can see what's in the PPA, pick what you need, and close the door after

zerozero wrote:just want to say:1st: i don't have an Iphone or Ipod, so this how-to is useless to me,2nd: but if it can be of any good for anybody, i think it starts wrongly, and i explain why:

- there's no need to enable the add-apt-repository functionality, specially though a script;- if you really need those pkgs add the repo to your source.list and after comment it out, easier! and safer!- this way you can see what's in the PPA, pick what you need, and close the door after

When I first looked into getting the newer firmware iPhones to mount on Linux, I actually tried this before I even heard of add-apt-repository. It returned errors upon apt-get update, though, so I put what worked for me in the tutorial.

I should have clarified. It writes the song to the nano(similar but not identical to the 4g iphone) but the nano can't read it. Almost like using it as an external drive. I don't know what permissions are necessary. I know I have rw for the drive. I didn't honestly didn't expect to do anymore than play music off of the ipod.

Seca wrote:I should have clarified. It writes the song to the nano(similar but not identical to the 4g iphone) but the nano can't read it. Almost like using it as an external drive. I don't know what permissions are necessary. I know I have rw for the drive. I didn't honestly didn't expect to do anymore than play music off of the ipod.

Oh, so the files are there but the iPod's database isn't updating for some reason?

Yeah, files are on the flash, but not playable. I'm a little confused. I didn't think it was possible to sync these(nano6g) with any linux distro yet. Hit me up on the irc if you want to trouble shoot, otherwise I'll be watching this thread.

Seca wrote:Hey, just finished dinner. I just checked, seems libgvfscommon0 is already installed. I guess I'm going to play around with it tonight. Maybe there is a group I need to belong to. Who knows..

Good luck to you. I'll keep looking for someone who's willing to let me borrow their iPod cable so I can do some investigation of my own. I'm not sure if it will be much help though since the iPod Video I have isn't from the same era as your iPod Nano 6G or my friend's iPhone 4G.

Another bug my friend is running into:Whenever he tries to sync music it not only doesn't update in the database but it screws up the album covers too. For example a Foo Fighters album cover showed up on an Alice In Chains song. This is also probably a problem with the database not updating.

Hi resuni. I remember the same thing happening in gtkpod+rhythmbox on my older nanos. I never did get the wrong album art issue resolved but I only used it when it was hooked into my car stereo so it wasn't really an issue. II think libimobiledevice is still under heavy development, so it might be resolved in the future.

I did get a hold of an iPod Touch. I can't even get it to show up in rhythmbox where the iPod nano will. It does mount, there just isn't a tab in the left column. Does your friends Touch have a camera on the front and rear?

It's an iPhone 4. And this tutorial was supposed to fix that problem. His shows up in Rhythmbox but when he adds the files they won't show up in the database and it messes up the album art whenever he tries to add stuff.

I guess the one I have won't work because it is 4.2.1. http://imagebin.org/135272 is a screenshot. idevicepair unpair was in the libimobiledevice-utils package. I tried before and after running the utill and used the video on libimobildevice.org as reference to make sure I followed correct procedure.

For anyone else, I will update if I find success syncing music with iPod Touch firmware version 4.2.1 or iPod nano 6g version 1.0.

You should try talking to the guys in irc://irc.freenode.net/libimobiledevice about that. They're helping me with the database updating problem. Unfortunately there's no official release of iPhone 4 syncing support in libimobiledevice but a guy there gave me some packages. Since I don't know enough about these packages I'm not going to publish them here but if you want to talk to him he's in that IRC channel.